Category: News

This past Friday, Lizzo released “Grrrls,” the latest single off of her upcoming album Special. The song is a bouncy, playful track about her and her girls having each other’s backs. Trouble is, there was a word that Lizzo used in the song’s lyrics that many fans found ableist and incredibly offensive.

In the song’s original lyrics, Lizzo sings, “Hold my bag, bitch, Hold my bag. Do you see this sh*t? I’mma spazz.” The use of the word “spazz” is seen as derogatory to people with cerebral palsy, a condition also known as “spastic diplegia.” Fans and advocates for people with disabilities flooded Lizzo with requests to remove the lyric citing how hurtful it was to them and offensive to many. “Your new song makes me pretty angry + sad. ‘Spaz’ doesn’t mean freaked out or crazy. It’s an ableist slur. It’s 2022. Do better,” tweeted Hannah Diviney, a disability advocate with cerebral palsy.

Another user said that, “As someone who champions women, plus size people and others whom society treats poorly, Lizzo preaches inclusivity and should do better.”

Well, Lizzo has listened to these valid concerns and not only issued an apology, but has also changed the lyrics of the song. Her full statement posted to social media is as follows:

“It’s been brought to my attention that there is a harmful word in my new song “GRRRLS”,” a statement on Twitter from the “Truth Hurts” singer began. “Let me make one thing clear: I never want to promote derogatory language. As a fat black woman in America, I’ve had many hurtful words used against me so I overstand the power words can have (whether intentionally or in my case, unintentionally). I’m proud to say there’s a new version of GRRRLS with a lyric change. This is the result of me listening and taking action. As an influential artist I’m dedicated to being part of the change I’ve been waiting to see in the world. xoxo Lizzo”

Now instead of “I’mma spazz,” the lyrics say “Do you see this sh*t, hold me back.” It’s a very simple tweak that doesn’t change the point of the song at all, but now doesn’t offend people with disabilities. The new version has already been replaced in the YouTube link, but the Spotify version of the song had not yet changed as of press time.

As for Hannah Diviney, the advocate who first reached out to her on Saturday, she read Lizzo’s statement and was over the moon. “I’m going to cry. Thank you so much for hearing us Lizzo and for understanding that this was only ever meant gently and being open to learning, it honestly means the world. You’re a real true ally.”

Listen to the updated version of “Grrrls” above.

Lizzo is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

A little over a week ago, Bruce Springsteen joined Coldplay on stage at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey to perform a couple of songs. This was a big deal for frontman Chris Martin, whose arm is adorned with a tattoo that reads “Working On A Dream,” which is a reference to the title track from Bruce Springsteen’s 2009 album.

Coldplay is keeping up the excitement for its fans. On Saturday night in Atlanta, Kelly Rowland joined them for a cover of Destiny’s Child’s “Independent Women, Pt. 1.” This unexpected collaboration turned out to be a pleasant surprise for the crowd, who couldn’t have wished for more, and their voices are compatible as they engage in alluring harmonies.

In April, Rowland spoke about a Child’s Destiny reunion in an interview with Entertainment Tonight. “We love everybody so much that we wouldn’t toy with it, but I do think that… you would deserve a surprise,” she said. “I feel like everything is just so planned so we see it before it happens and we see the process right after it happens. It’s just a lot, like, we deserve spontaneity, we desire to be surprised and I would hope Destiny’s Child would be a pleasant surprise.”

Watch the video of the “Independent Women, Pt. 1” performance above.

Faux-German heiress and grifter Anna Sorokin, aka “Anna Delvey,” has had a pretty prolific second act. She was the focus of a riveting New Yorker piece, which inspired a much-discussed Netflix show, in which she was played by Madonna biopic-bound Julia Garner. (Alas, she was not a fan of that one.) Recently she had her first solo art show, which wasn’t terribly well-received. And she’s done it all while in ICE custody, serving a four-year sentence.

What’s next? If you didn’t guess that she’d try her hand at NFTs, then perhaps you’re someone she could have fleeced. A press release reveals that Sorokin/”Delvey” is getting in on the craze, albeit a bit later than most did:

Holders of the Reinventing Anna NFT will get “access to Anna” and a select group of top holders will have access to coveted personal items from her time in prison and personal sketches drawn by Anna herself. Ten gold edition NFTs that are randomly minted will grant holders the privilage of a one on one call with Anna, and three ultra rare platinum edition NFT holders will get the opportunity to meet Anna in-person, as well as receive a package of personal items.

Sorokin/”Delvey”’s move into NFTs comes just in time for the drama around Seth Green’s stolen Bored Ape tokens. Great timing!

In a recently unearthed video from 1998, Larry David, co-creator of “Seinfeld,” sits down with Charlie Rose to talk about the end of the hit TV show. Within the first few minutes of the interview, David drops a line that leaves Rose temporarily speechless. “Seinfeld” was not pitched as a show about nothing and everyone’s memory of that being true was actually taken from a “Seinfeld” episode.

If you need a moment to collect yourself, please take it. I was shocked because I clearly remember it being about nothing. And if you have no idea who or what “Seinfeld” was, let me fill you in. “Seinfeld” was once at the top of the sitcom world and introduced a standup comedian named Jerry Seinfeld and his friends to the world. Viewers came back every week to watch all of the randomly hilarious situations that Seinfeld would find himself in and would close with him doing a comedic monologue on stage about the very things we saw him experience. How did a large group of people believe that the show was supposed to be about nothing?

Our brains are so powerful. We hear something and eventually that becomes reality, whether it’s true or not. It’s a phenomenon known as the Mandela effect where our brains create a false memory. Surprisingly it happens more often than one would think. Nelson Mandela died in 2013, but for some reason a ridiculous amount of people remember him dying in the 1980s while still in jail. There are countless examples of this phenomenon, including whether Curious George had a tail or not and if the Monopoly man wore a monocle.

No matter how many people insist their memory is correct about “Seinfeld,” you can’t really dispute the show’s creator. I’m pretty sure he would know what he pitched and wrote. Either way, this was certainly a fun relic to dig up. And will surely leave people scratching their heads and questioning their memories.

Reese Witherspoon, 46, and her ex-husband Ryan Phillippe, 47, showed that homeschooled kids deserve graduation, too, by putting on an impromptu backyard ceremony for their son Deacon Phillippe, 18.

Approximately 6% of the kids in America are homeschooled, a number that increased significantly after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ryan Philippe, who was dressed up in a cap and gown to play the principal at the graduation, shared photos and a video clip of the ceremony on Instagram.

In the video, Deacon Phillippe proudly accepts his diploma while Elgar’s “Pomp and Circumstance” plays in the background. After receiving a few congratulatory hugs, he threw his cap in the air and it landed in the pool. But before the cap was completely water-logged, Witherspoon came to the rescue and fished it out.

See on Instagram

Deacon’s diploma says it was from “Mountain High School” and was signed by his parents. He responded to the post by leaving a comment, “Best dad ever.”

In addition to Deacon, Witherspoon and Ryan Philippe have a daughter, Ava Phillippe, 22. The former couple met on the set of “Cruel Intentions” and were married in 1999. They divorced in 2007.

Ryan Philippe also has a daughter, Kai Knapp, with his ex-girlfriend Alexis Knapp. Witherspoon has a son with her husband James Toth, Tennessee James Toth, 9.

Witherspoon can’t believe her son grew up so quickly.

“How did this happen?!! @deaconphillippe is 18?!!” she wrote in an Instagram post on his 18th birthday. “One day he was trading Pokémon cards, singing Bruno Mars songs, and playing American Ninja Warrior in the backyard. The next day, he is taller than me, cooking the family steaks on the grill and making his own music with his best friends. My heart is bursting with pride about the young man he is becoming.”

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Witherspoon and Philippe have worked hard to remain friends as they’ve co-parented two kids over the years.

“I always tell my kids, ‘You’re so lucky cause it’s not just your mom and dad who love you. You have grandparents that love you, a stepdad that loves you and it’s always such a great opportunity to have as many people in your life nurturing you and carrying you and guiding you in this life,’” Witherspoon told ABC News.

What’s next for Deacon Philippe after graduating high school? He has spent a lot of his time making music recently. His first single, “Long Run,” made it to iTunes Top 20 and features vocals by Nina Nesbitt.

“I have a teenage voice,” he told Interview, “so I’m going to stick to writing and producing.”

“I realized there’s more to making music than just being a vocalist, and that a lot of times it’s the production that makes me feel something,” he added. “I asked my dad about how it works, and he taught me all the stuff he knew, and then I started watching YouTube videos.”

However, as the son of two prominent Hollywood actors, Deacon also has his sights set on the silver screen. “That’s definitely something I’m interested in,” he says about pursuing acting. “From the time I was really young, I remember paparazzi being around. I don’t really know what it’s like not to be seen by the public.”

Earlier this year, indie darlings The Beths returned with “A Real Thing,” their first song in two years after their 2020 album Jump Rope Gazers. Now they’re back in full force with the announcement of a new LP entitled Expert In A Dying Field, due in September. The lead single “Silence Is Golden” is out now.

“The song is about stress and anxiety manifesting as an intolerance to noise,” bandleader Liz Stokes said about the new song. “Where each new sound makes you more and more stressed.” This sense of sensory overload is evident in the fierce, unrelenting feeling of this track, which catapults forward with chaotic, discordant guitars that only intensify throughout. The press release notes that Expert In A Dying Field is the kind of album that aims to channel the energy of live shows, and so far it succeeds with this fuzzed-out, invigorating tune.

The album was recorded at guitarist Jonathan Pearce’s studio in the band’s hometown of Auckland, New Zealand. This worked out for the first half of the album, until they were interrupted by quarantine at the end of 2021. They finished it in three days in Los Angeles after a US tour.

Watch the video for “Silence Is Golden” above. Check out the album artwork and tracklist below.

1. “Expert In A Dying Field”
2. “Knees Deep”
3. “Silence Is Golden”
4. “Your Side”
5. “I Want To Listen”
6. “Head In The Clouds”
7. “Best Left”
8. “Change In The Weather”
9. “When You Know You Know”
10. “A Passing Rain”
11. “I Told You That I Was Afraid”
12. “2am”

Expert In A Dying Field is out 9/16 on Carpark Records. Pre-order it here.

Philip Baker Hall was a great actor — a theater god who didn’t do his first movie until he was almost 40, who didn’t get his first big role until he was over 50, and who only became a big name when he was pushing 70. When word of his passing at 90 years old broke on Monday, people remembered his incredible turns in films like Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, and Magnolia (all for Paul Thomas Anderson), as well as Say Anything…, Zodiac, Argo, and so many more. Some pointed to the one-man film Secret Honor, in which he played Richard Nixon having a 90-minute meltdown.

To many, though, Hall’s most beloved work came on the small screen. In 1991, he appeared on Seinfeld on the Season 3 episode “The Library” — one of the show’s best — in which Jerry learns he has a mysterious outstanding fine at the New York Public Library. At one point he’s visited by the NYPL’s investigations officer, who’s actually named Lt. Bookman and who’s played by Hall. It’s maybe the series’ best scene. Part of the reason is that Hall plays him as a hard-boiled detective out of ‘40s pulp fiction, all rapid-fire accusations punctuated by dramatic finger-pointing. Seinfeld himself looks like he’s struggling not to laugh.

Hall’s passing led many on social media to share the clip, or to simply fawn over, as Patton Oswalt put it, “hands down, the greatest guest spot in a sitcom, ever.”

Some shared the clip of Hall popping up on another Larry David program, Curb Your Enthusiasm.

And others shared Hall’s incredible work in other films, often as a scene-stealing character actor, and in too few (Secret Honor, Hard Eight) as the lead

You can watch Hall’s astonishing work on Seinfeld in the video above. Rest in peace, Philip Baker Hall.

TikTok is a weird, weird place. It’s the only social media platform that champions randomness above all else — there is never any rhyme or reason to why something blows up on TikTok, it just happens. Like the Tortilla Challenge, a recent trend that has exploded on the app in which a small circle or pair of people will repeatedly slap each other in the face with a flour tortilla while holding liquid in their cheeks until someone inevitably spits out the liquid on to the “winner.”

There are a few notable variations on the trend, some people play a game of rock, paper, scissors to decide who gets the first slap and some people skip the mouthful of water. We have a bone to pick with the latter, if you’re going to slap your close friends and loved ones with a flour tortilla for all of the internet to see, at the very least do so while running the risk of getting spit on. Have you no decency?

While getting spit on might not exactly be winning per se, watching an endless feed of other people slap each other with flour tortillas until they spew water (or whatever, get creative!) all over one another, is a quick way to triumph over boredom while you’re waiting on something or someone. So we picked out the best spins on the trend and compiled them for your viewing pleasure so that you don’t ruin your own TikTok algorithm and get nothing but tortilla slaps in your feed for the next week.

A few observations this trend has given us: big tortillas produce the best slapping sounds, some people call tortillas “tortilla wraps” or “flatbread,” and an uncomfortable amount of couples seem to take a lot of pleasure in slapping each other with tortillas.

Kanye West isn’t happy about Adidas’ new shoe, calling out the company’s CEO over “blatant copying” and calling the Adilette 22 slides ” a fake Yeezy made by Adidas themselves.” After deleting his first-quarter shenanigans from Instagram, it looked like he’d return to using the platform primarily to showcase his creative endeavors, like this weird McDonald’s packaging redesign. That lasted less than a month; he returned today to post a screenshot of the Adilette (apparently taken from a sneaker interest site) and lambast the German shoe manufacturer, despite the fact that they’ve been his design partner since 2015.

“THIS IS YE driving down the same street Kobe passed on,” he wrote. “Maybe I feel that Mamba spirit right now To Kasper I’m not standing for this blatant copying no more To all sneaker culture To every ball player rapper or even if you work at the store This is for everyone who wants to express themselves but feel they can’t cause they’ll loose their contract or be called crazy Bravery is not being afraid Bravery is overcoming your fear for your truth This Ye with the blue paint on my face These shoes represent the disrespect that people in power have to the talent This shoe is a fake Yeezy made by adidas themselves I’m not talking to DC about this either Kasper come talk to me Happy Monday”

… Look, man. Not to be that guy, but… Pot, meet kettle. Remember Nike’s Roshe silhouette? That year you couldn’t go anywhere without running into 500 pairs of those things on everyone’s feet from hardcore sneakerheads to errand-running girl dads. Then, Kanye switched teams from Nike because he didn’t like the terms of his partnership there, only to go to Adidas and drop the Yeezy Boost 350 — which looks almost exactly like Nike Roshes, despite his claim that it’s the “most iconic shoe of the past 15 years.” (Let’s not even get into how Walmart sued him because his new Yeezy Gap logo looks just like Walmart’s or how people thought the original Yeezy Slides look just like Crocs.)

Anyway, I’m sure this will lead to all kinds of chaos in the sneaker world this week, so if you’re an enthusiast (or a recovering one), buckle up. There could be some seismic shifts in the future.

Charlotte Hornets center Montrezl Harrell is set to be a free agent on July 1, but he is facing more pressing issues regarding his future, on and off the court, after a traffic stop in Kentucky last month.

According to court records and a police report obtained by the Charlotte Observer’s Rod Boone, Harrell was pulled over on May 12 for following a car too close in Richmond, Kent., and police claim a subsequent search of the vehicle he was driving found three pounds of weed.

Trooper Jesse Owens stated he “upon stop observed odor of marijuana” from the silver 2020 Honda Pilot that Harrell was driving, according to the citation. Harrell, Owens wrote in the report, “admitted to being in possession of marijuana and produced a small amount from his sweatpants.” During a subsequent search of the vehicle, which the report states Harrell claims was rented, “three pounds of marijuana in vacuum sealed bags” were found in a backpack in the back seat, according to the citation. He’s been charged with trafficking less than five pounds of marijuana.

That charge is a Class D felony in Kentucky, carrying a potential sentence of 1-5 years and a fine of up to $10,000. Harrell was set to be arraigned on Monday morning at 9 a.m., but no further details have emerged since that scheduled court appearance. Kentucky is one of 14 states in the United States without legalized marijuana in any form, medical or recreational.